Google-financed fund gives big boost to Charlie Hebdo

A fund financed by Google will offer major support to help Paris’ Charlie Hebdo with its long-term survival, which includes printing 1 million copies of the satirical French weekly next week.

The Google AIPG Fund for Digital Innovation, set up to support the French press and run independently of the Mountain View company, pledged close to $300,000 to help the publication, fund director Ludovic Blecher confirmed in an e-mail Friday. Eight journalists, two police officers, a maintenance worker and a visitor were killed in Wednesday’s attack, which left 11 people wounded, four of them critically.

The Guardian newspaper previously reported that French media groups including Le Monde, France Télévisions and Radio France could be working on a plan to offer more financial support.

“We are a fund for the press,” Blecher told the Guardian. “We must enable them to be able to write, even if we don’t agree, it’s a question of diversity of speech.”

He added: “The fund is trying to figure out a way to provide a financial support to Charlie Hebdo. We’re working on a process in order to find an exceptional answer to an exceptional situation. The role of the fund is to help the press. We’re playing our role. But we are still working on the technical process.”